


versus the self (who also has two more legs)

by ultalumna (yujael)



Series: and they told us we couldn't live like this [4]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Insomnia, when the cat who only likes one person likes you too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-02
Packaged: 2019-12-30 19:29:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18321731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yujael/pseuds/ultalumna
Summary: The first night that Gladio sleeps in that tiny apartment, he can't quite get to sleep, not for a while. There's nothing like some inadvertent assistance from a cat to solve that problem, though.





	versus the self (who also has two more legs)

The apartment is nearly silent at night. Someone in the unit below putters around briefly, their sounds on the edge of dull to Gladio, lying on the living room floor on a sleeping bag. Down the hall, bed springs creak as either Prompto or Noctis shifts around. Probably Prompto. Kid’s still fidgety, awake or asleep, no matter how well he seems to have adjusted to life here.

On the couch next to Gladio, his body just a foot away, Ignis snores softly, huddled under a blanket with a pillow covered in tiny chocobos. Gladio has a fish patterned blanket himself, freshly washed.

Aside from all that, though, there’s only the night birds outside making any noise, any movement. No rustling leaves or small creatures scurrying through the underbrush.

Just the sounds of a regular night in this one bedroom apartment on the edge of Galdin Quay--with the exception of some shuffling as Gladio turns around again because he can’t quite get over the fact that the roof over his head is, y’know, a roof.

This is how they live, how they sleep every night. Ignis looks practically cozy on the couch, his glasses folded neatly next to a glass of water on the coffee table. Gladio reaches up to sip from it, which is something he can do because the table is also right next to him, shoved away from its usual position to make room for him and still sandwiching him in next to the couch.

It can’t move much farther because the ridiculously big chair in the corner takes up too much of the room’s real estate for all that it’s still a chair and not actually a loveseat. Maybe he could sleep in that, see how that goes for him.

Before Gladio can continue weighing the pros and cons of trying out the big chair, something presses hard right in the centre of his gut, something sharp under heavy weight. His eyes snap down to catch whatever it is, ready to react in the darkness until he catches the yellow eyes glinting in the dim light offered by the living room window.

Oh, yeah. They’ve got cats, too. The picture of bizarre domesticity grows.

Ignis II, the friendly little calico, always sleeps on Noct’s face at night, apparently. The great black feline staring Gladio down now, putting all its weight down on the one paw on his gut, is Gladio II. Gladio can’t tell if he wants to laugh at the name or not. He’s kind of bamboozled either way--but at the same time, the fact that Noctis and Prompto got two cats and named them the way they did makes Gladio want to punch them a little less.

He doesn’t laugh about the name right now, though. He doesn’t know what he did to summon Gladio II to rise from his spot at Ignis’ feet--a spot he apparently also takes every night--but if there’s some kind of test going on right now, he’ll rise to it.

He raises his hand, fingers flat, palm open. Gladio II stares at it for a few long seconds, deep in contemplation. A second paw comes down to support the weight of what might be one of the heaviest house cats Gladio’s ever encountered as it sniffs his fingers, whiskers just brushing the skin.

Paws three and four come down after a long moment, the collar around the cat’s neck jingling softly, and Gladio tenses under them to give himself some relief from those four points of sharp pressure. Gladio II ignores any perceived discomfort going on under him as he meanders up to Gladio’s chest and noses along his cheek. Gladio’s nose itches under the cat’s long fur, but he lets the cat continue its inspection.

Gladio II had hissed at him something strong the moment he’d walked in the door, so this is a pretty vast improvement. It makes him feel like some sort of cat whisperer and instills some of the calmness that filled him on nights out on the road when some curious, friendly wildlife wandered through his camp.

Eventually, Gladio II turns around and hops back up to the couch, disturbing Ignis only marginally. The cat curls up at Ignis’ feet again, stares at Gladio for another moment, and then goes back to sleep, leaving Gladio’s blanket covered in an inexplicable amount of cat hair.   

Something about the entire interaction soothes the rolling in Gladio’s gut, the omnipresent feeling that he’s going to wake up on the ground somewhere without this fish blanket, alone near the side of the road instead of crowded into a miraculously silent one bedroom apartment. At the end of the day, Gladio has been accepted by the cat at best and has been determined a piece of furniture at worst. Either way, Gladio is sleeping on this floor and there’s no force under this roof that can move him.

He turns over one last time. He knows it’s the last time the same way he knows he’s going to fall asleep soon and wake up on the floor, squished between the coffee table and the couch. The same way he knows Ignis is going to have to either climb over the back of the couch or step on him when he gets up and tries to sneak into the kitchen before someone else can remind him that it’s not his turn to cook. The same way he knows Prompto, of all people, is going to get up first so that he can run. The same way he knows Noctis will actually get up and have energy before noon because he’s scheduled for work.

Because that’s how they live in this apartment, and he’s here, now.

 

*

 

Prompto wakes up early in the morning and tiptoes out of the bedroom. He lingers in the living room, probably checking on its inhabitants, but doesn’t notice that Gladio is awake before slipping out the door, and he returns ten minutes before Ignis wakes up.

Ignis rolls over, reaches for his glasses, and grunts when he has to lean over more than usual to reach them, which Gladio should really take as a sign of what’s to come but doesn’t until Ignis stands up and not only steps on Gladio, but trips over him and damn near rolls his ankle before he catches himself on the arm of the couch.

“Watch it, Iggy,” Gladio says as Gladio II starts yowling, indignant about almost being squished under Ignis.

Prompto all but bursts out of his bedroom a half second later and informs Gladio that this is not Ignis’ usual wake up time by way of hissing, “Aha! I knew you’d try something sneaky! Good job, Gladio. Keep holding him down, it’s  _my_ turn in the kitchen.”

He turns and scampers back to the kitchen before Gladio can figure out if Prompto was referring to him or the cat.

Ignis sighs and all but flops back onto the couch. “Good morning,” he says to Gladio, eyes still sleepy, hair bedraggled. “Did you sleep well?”

Gladio wriggles out from under the fish blanket and stretches his arms above his head. He feels looser, more rested than he has in a long while. Prompto hums and clinks dishes together as he prepares breakfast. The bed down the hall creaks as Noctis shifts around. This is how their days get started.

“Yeah,” Gladio says, shuffling around to finally try out the big chair. It’s almost perfect. Maybe it belongs in this corner after all. Gladio II hops up onto the arm of the chair and brushes by Gladio's shoulder before perching on the back of the chair behind his head. “Yeah, I did.”

**Author's Note:**

> This night takes place on the tail end of the third chapter of "it's just you and me." It's also an exercise in tetris skills to get four people settled into a one bedroom apartment for the night.


End file.
